Owning digital media content implies that it can be stored forever without being exposed to the physical world, but this is not always the case – in reality, we do not own the digital content we buy. This is confirmed by the latest case of Sony, which is about to remove shows like Mythbusters and Naked and Afraid, as well as many other Discovery projects, from PlayStation users’ libraries, even if users have already bought them.
The situation came to light when Sony sent out a warning to PlayStation users who purchased TV shows from Discovery, the network that recently merged with Warner Bros.
Subject to our licensing agreements with content providers, you will no longer be able to watch your previously purchased Discovery content and it will be removed from your video library.
The link in the email takes you to the PlayStation page, which lists all the affected shows. Given Discovery’s penchant for producing seasons of relatively cheap but popular reality shows and documentaries, there are plenty of them. Among them are such hits as: Say Yes to the Dress, Shark Week, Cake Boss, Long Island Medium, Deadly Women and many others.
One concerned PlayStation user on Reddit asked:
Is there a way to save this content? I use PlayStation 4… But I bought a lot of seasons of shows like Dual Survival that I don’t want to lose. When purchasing, I thought that I would always have access to the content…
Movies and TV shows first appeared on the PlayStation Network in 2008 on PS3. Then it was possible to transfer purchased content between devices for viewing, for example, on the PlayStation Portable. Sony removed this option starting with PS4. Now, almost any content purchased on PSN, be it a PS5 blockbuster or Police Women of Cincinnati, for example, is essentially made available indefinitely until the PlayStation servers go down or the original copyright owner decides to remove the content.
This isn’t the first time Sony has done something like this, and it certainly won’t be the last. So if you want to avoid this, it’s better to buy your favorite shows on Blu-ray, although Sony and Microsoft also seem to be planning to phase out optical drives in the future.
